{"id":121537,"date":"2021-12-26T16:34:08","date_gmt":"2021-12-26T23:34:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=121537"},"modified":"2021-12-26T16:34:08","modified_gmt":"2021-12-26T23:34:08","slug":"sri-lanka-to-sign-trincomalee-oil-tank-farm-deal-with-india-in-a-month-says-minister","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2021\/12\/26\/sri-lanka-to-sign-trincomalee-oil-tank-farm-deal-with-india-in-a-month-says-minister\/","title":{"rendered":"Sri Lanka to sign Trincomalee oil tank farm deal with India in a month, says Minister"},"content":{"rendered":"

Meera Srinivasan courtesy The Hindu<\/a><\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n

The facility has 99 storage tanks with a capacity of 12,000 kilolitres each<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After a year of visible strain in its ties with Colombo, New Delhi may finally have some reason for cheer. In a month\u2019s time, Sri Lanka will ink the long-dragging deal with India to jointly develop the Trincomalee oil tank farms \u2014 a coveted project that has remained controversial for decades.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We have been negotiating this for 16 months, and we are now very close to finalising the terms of the Trincomalee project with India. We hope to sign the agreement in a month,\u201d Energy Minister Udaya Gammanpila told The Hindu<\/em> on Sunday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Minister said he has instructed the Ceylon Petroleum Corporation (CPC) to form a subsidiary company, Trinco Petroleum Terminal Ltd., for the purpose. The move follows President Gotabaya Rajapaksa\u2019s nod to setting up the special purpose vehicle ahead of the next Cabinet meeting. We don\u2019t have a Cabinet meeting this week because of the holidays. We will get the decision ratified in the next one,\u201d Mr. Gammanpila said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During the Second World War, the British built the Trincomalee oil tank farms to serve as a refuelling station, adjacent to the Trincomalee port, an enviable natural harbour. The nearly century-old oil tanks need to be refurbished \u2014 at the cost of millions of dollars \u2014 if they are to be fit for use again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If the deal is finalised and signed next month, it will not only mark the culmination of India\u2019s 16-month-long negotiation with the ruling Rajapaksa administration but will also give shape to a proposal envisaged 35 years ago, in the Indo-Lanka Accord. Despite the Accord \u2014 in its annexure \u2014 stating that the work of restoring and operating the Trincomalee oil tank farm will be undertaken as a joint venture between India and Sri Lanka\u201d, things barely moved until 2003, when the Indian Oil Corporation set up Lanka IOC, its Sri Lankan subsidiary.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The facility, interestingly located in \u2018China Bay\u2019, has 99 storage tanks with a capacity of 12,000 kilolitres each, spread across the Upper Tank Farm and the Lower Tank Farm, where LIOC currently runs 15 tanks. The new agreement being negotiated pertains to the remaining tanks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The early modernisation\u201d of the Trincomalee oil tank farms found mention in the official statement released by the Sri Lankan mission in New Delhi, on Finance Minister Basil Rajapaksa\u2019s visit in November, indicating the priority accorded to it. Mr. Basil, the youngest brother of President Gotabaya and Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa, sought extensive economic assistance from New Delhi to help Sri Lanka tide over its economic crisis compounded by the pandemic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Diplomatic sources indicated that New Delhi\u2019s nod for the emergency Lines of Credit and currency swap requests from Colombo was contingent on the Rajapaksa administration moving forward on the Trincomalee deal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, dismissing the idea, Mr. Gammanpila said: Some including the political opposition are suggesting that India\u2019s economic assistance is tied to the Trincomalee deal. I vehemently deny that. We began negotiating this agreement well before the economic assistance was sought,\u201d insisting there is no connection whatsoever.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is nearly a month since Mr. Basil visited New Delhi, and the countries agreed to a four-pronged approach\u201d that would help Sri Lanka mitigate its current economic crisis. There is no official word on the assistance so far.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Meera Srinivasan courtesy The Hindu The facility has 99 storage tanks with a capacity of 12,000 kilolitres each After a year of visible strain in its ties with Colombo, New Delhi may finally have some reason for cheer. In a month\u2019s time, Sri Lanka will ink the long-dragging deal with India to jointly develop the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-121537","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121537","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=121537"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121537\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=121537"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=121537"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=121537"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}